KRA, Siegfried J. 1930-

PERSONAL: Born September 13, 1930, in Danzig (now Gdansk), Poland (one source cites Switzerland); immigrated to United States, naturalized U.S. citizen; married Renee Saltz; children: Lisette, Annice. Ethnicity: "White/Jewish." Education: City College (now of the City University of New York), B.S., 1954; University of Lausanne, M.D., 1960. Hobbies and other interests: Tennis, art collecting, writing, theater, travel.

ADDRESSES: Home—24 Pleasant Hill Rd., Woodbridge, CT 06525. Offıce—Heart Care Associates, 2200 Whitney Ave., Hamden, CT 06518. Agent—Don Gastwirth & Associates, 265 College St., #10-N, New Haven, CT 06510; Susan Cohen, Writers House, 21 West 26th St., New York, NY 10010. E-mail—drkra@earthlink.net.

CAREER: Physician, writer. Brooklyn Jewish Hospital, Brooklyn, NY, intern, 1960-61; Hospital of St. Raphael, New Haven, CT, resident, 1961-63; Yale University, New Haven, CT, fellow, 1963-64, clinical instructor, 1965-70, assistant clinical professor, 1970-78, associate clinical professor of medicine, 1979—, fellow of Trumbull College, 1989—. Baylor College of Medicine, adjunct assistant professor, 1991—. Hospital of St. Raphael, staff physician, 1964—, member of long-range planning committee, 1982; Yale-New Haven Hospital, staff physician, 1965—. WNYC-TV, host of national public radio program A Heart-to-Heart Talk, 1982-93; guest lecturer, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, 1997; guest on television programs.

MEMBER: American College of Physicians (fellow), American Medical Association, American Heart Association, American Federation for Clinical Research, American Society of Echocardiography, American College of Cardiology (associate fellow), American Medical Writers Association, Connecticut Association of Cardiologists, Connecticut Society of Echocardiography (member of board of governors, 1978-85; vice-president, 1979-80).

AWARDS, HONORS: Fellowship from Yale University School of Medicine, 1963-64; Physician's Recognition Awards from American Medical Association, 1969, 1979, 1983, 1986, 1991, 1995, 2000, and 2001; awards from Medical Economics for articles written in 1980 and 1983.

WRITINGS:

Basic Correlative Echocardiography: Technique andInterpretation, Medical Examination Publishing (New Hyde Park, NY), 1977.

(With Robert S. Boltax) Is Surgery Necessary?, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1981.

(With K. V. Schwartz) Deductive EchocardiographyCase Studies, Medical Examination Publishing (New Hyde Park, NY), 1981.

Examine Your Doctor: A Patient's Guide to AvoidingMedical Mishaps, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1982.

(Author of foreword) E. Stern and J. Michaels, TheGood Heart Diet Cookbook, Ticknor & Fields (New York, NY), 1982.
Basic M-Mode Echocardiography, 2nd edition, Medical Examination Publishing (New Hyde Park, NY), 1982.

Aging Myths: Reversible Causes of Mind and MemoryLoss, McGraw-Hill (New York, NY), 1986.

Coronary Bypass Surgery: Who Needs It?, Norton (New York, NY), 1986.

(With others) Physical Diagnosis, Elsevier Science (New York, NY), 1987.

Principles of Auscultation, Elsevier Science (New York, NY), 1989.

What Every Woman Must Know about Heart Disease:A No-Nonsense Approach to Diagnosing, Treating, and Preventing the #1 Killer of Women, Time Warner (New York, NY), 1996.

(Contributor) Emergency Room Stories, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 1996.

How to Keep Your Husband Alive!, Lebhar-Friedman Books (New York, NY), 2002.

fiction

The Three-Legged Stallion and Other Tales from aDoctor's Notebook, Norton (New York, NY), 1989.

A Doctor's Visit: More Tales from a Doctor's Notebook, Lorenzo Press (Norwich, CT), 2004.

Contributor to The Doctor's Guide to Better Tennis and Health, edited by Claude A. Frazier. Contributor of articles, reviews, and short stories to medical journals and other periodicals, including New York Times, Connecticut, Sunshine, Medical Economics, Yankee, and Tennis.

SIDELIGHTS: Dr. Siegfried J. Kra is an associate professor of medicine at Yale University who has written practical self-help medical texts for the general public. Kra's books focus on preventive medicine—from ways to keep the brain agile into old age to efforts to improve and maintain cardiovascular function. Kra addresses most of his information to women, because he recognizes that women are more willing to visit the doctor than are men. Hence, when Kra wanted to write a health book for men, he entitled it, How to Keep Your Husband Alive! Although it addresses men's health issues and symptoms of disease in men, the book is written for women readers who are likely to see the symptoms in their spouses or life partners. What Every Woman Must Know about Heart Disease describes the differences between heart illnesses in men and women and offers practical advice to postmenopausal women on keeping themselves healthy into old age. Aging Myths: Reversible Causes of Mind and Memory Loss suggests that older people must avoid boredom and disbelieve the myth that memory loss is an inevitable outcome of aging. Marian Wynne Haber in the Nursing Homes Long-Term Care Management magazine noted that portions of the book are "very informative and psychologically uplifting."

Dr. Kra turned to fiction with his 1989 short-story collection The Three-Legged Stallion and Other Tales from a Doctor's Notebook. He reprised that accomplishment in 2004 with A Doctor's Visit: More Tales from a Doctor's Notebook, which includes three novellas and five short stories. As his publisher explained on the Lorenzo Press Web site: "Dr. Kra's personal history is as intriguing as any work of fiction. He grew up in Europe during the early years of World War Two, the son of a wealthy Jewish coal dealer in Danzig who fled with his family to the U.S. after killing a German in a car accident. As a young man, Dr. Kra overcame poverty and prejudice, earning a fellowship to Yale and going on to study medicine in Switzerland. These stories, some previously published in magazines and journals, are based on his fascinating experiences."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

periodicals

Booklist, March 1, 1996, Whitney Scott, review of What Every Woman Must Know about Heart Disease: A No-Nonsense Approach to Diagnosing, Treating, and Preventing the #1 Killer of Women, p. 1114.

New York Times Book Review, March 23, 1986, Bard Lindeman, review of Aging Myths: Reversible Causes of Mind and Memory Loss, p. 47.

Nursing Homes Long-Term Care Management, May-June, 1986, Marian Wynne Haber, review of Aging Myths, p. 17.

Prevention, June, 1983.

Publishers Weekly, January 8, 1996, review of WhatEvery Woman Must Know about Heart Disease, p. 66.

Reno Gazette-Journal (Reno, NV), February 11, 2003, Jason Hidalgo, "Men's Health," p. E1.

Seattle Times, May 5, 2002, Beth Cooney, "Stupid Male Syndrome," review of How to Keep Your Husband Alive!, p. L6.

Us Weekly, July 6, 1982.*

online

Lorenzo Press Web site,http://www.lorenzopress.com/ (May 4, 2004), description of A Doctor's Visit: More Tales from a Doctor's Notebook.